The Dare Read online

  “Is it okay?” she asked, softly.

  “Fine,” I muttered and bit back the string of curse words I wanted to let rip. Instead my hand covered hers and I adjusted the ice pack so it wasn’t sitting directly on my nuts.

  Rick leaned against the exam table and chuckled to himself as if he found our interaction amusing. It was clear I was intrigued by her and the way her eyes wandered the room, desperate to look anywhere but directly at me, or rather at my swollen appendage, signaled she wanted to be anywhere but here.

  “You can see why we hired him, huh, sweetheart?” Rick grinned proudly, nodding in the direction of my swollen cock, and elbowed her softly in the side. “The big boys get the most views.”

  Her cheeks flushed pink and she tucked her chin to her chest. “Uh…” She stuttered.

  “Let’s just get on with it,” I growled. I didn’t care about the exam or being exposed, I just wanted to end her embarrassment as quickly as possible and I wanted Rick’s attention away from her.

  I didn’t know why I’d listened to Rick and taken those damn pills. There was no doubt I was attracted to the model he’d hired. She was gorgeous, petite and trim, any man would be happy to have sex with her, so that wasn’t the problem. It was the sheer look of terror on her face that was the issue. I’d tried to make polite conversation before the shoot began, but even small talk was too much for her. She excused herself to the kitchen, where she sat perched on a bar stool, her eyes closed tight, chest rising and falling as she took deep breaths. After she finally talked herself into going through with it, I was so weirded out that I couldn’t even keep my erection up—something that had never been a problem for me before.

  I wasn’t about to fuck some girl who was terrified of me. Sorry, not a turn-on and definitely not something I was into. Rick had assured me it was a performance issue, and stupidly I’d accepted the pills from him rather than explaining why I didn’t want to go through with it. Eventually I had to man up and explain the situation to him, but not before I took the pills and the damage was done.

  “So, you’re a porn star?” Alexa asked, her eyes flicking up to mine briefly before darting away again.

  She was as nervous as a field mouse in a stampede. “Does that bother you?” I bluffed. She didn’t need to know that this was my first ever film and I hadn’t even followed through with it. Besides, she’d already judged me. No sense in trying to defend my honor.

  Her eyes met mine again and held. “No.” Her voice sounded sure, but I couldn’t help noticing the blush creeping up her neck to color her cheeks. Watching her work, her small hands moving about to care for me stirred something inside. It’d been a long time since someone had taken care of me and I’d forgotten how good it felt. I watched her with intent, my eyes sweeping over her features yet again. Her closeness to my cock was doing nothing for my hard on.

  The doctor strode into the room—male, late-forties, and strait-laced, which put me at ease.

  After covering the basics—that I’d taken two of little blue pills even though only one was recommended and yes, I’d been fully erect going on four and half hours now—the doctor, thankfully, got right down to business, opening my robe. The swollen appendage jutted out in front of me, proudly saluting the doctor and Alexa.

  “There he is!” Rick beamed proudly. This dude was twisted. Why the hell was he so interested in my cock and why the hell was he still here? Sure my cock was above average, I knew that much. After Rick had approached me about starring in one of his movies, I’d looked up the statistics online and measured myself, just out of curiosity. It was much larger than average according to what I’d read online. But still, his interest was creepy and he was getting creepier by the second I reminded myself that he dealt with the human body all day long and that he was just thinking about the money I could make him when he looked at it, but that didn’t mean I liked another man eyeing my dick with such enthusiasm.

  My eyes flicked up to watch Alexa’s expression when my cock was revealed to the room. Gotta say, that was a bad fucking idea. Her mouth dropped open, her eyes appeared glazed and her chest heaved with shallow breaths. I practically felt her gaze caressing every throbbing each of me.

  “Is he family?” the doctor asked, glancing quickly at Rick before continuing his inspection of me.

  I shook my head. “Nope.”

  The doctor tipped his head to the door, motioning to Rick. “Would you mind stepping out of the room, sir?”

  “Sure thing, Doc.” Rick nodded. “I’m out of here just as soon as you tell me there’ll be no permanent damage to that money maker.”

  The doctor looked up at him, not amused. “He’ll live. Now please go.”

  Apparently satisfied by the doctor’s answer, Rick gave me a wink, patted my shoulder and exited the room.

  “So how exactly do you treat this?” My attention darted between the doctor and Alexa. “Please tell me there’s something we can do to get rid of this.”

  Alexa’s eyes shifted to the floor, like she knew I wasn’t going to like the doctor’s answer. I immediately braced for impact.

  “I’m going to give you a dose of medicine—a combination of a steroid and a muscle relaxant to see if that will return things to normal. You’ll take these orally and we’ll wait about thirty minutes. If that doesn’t work, I may have to insert a thin needle into the shaft and extract blood manually.” The doctor made a few notes in my file and left the room.

  I swallowed down a lump in my throat. The fucking pills had to work. I wouldn’t be able to handle him bringing a needle anywhere near my dick without punching the poor guy in the face.

  Alexa returned a few minutes later with a tiny plastic cup containing two pills and a cup of water for me. I downed the pills and water in a single gulp. Once again, she arranged the ice pack on my lap, her hand brushing against my dick, which made it jump. I saw her bite her lip to avoid smiling.

  “Thanks,” I muttered, passing the cup back to her before laying back on the bed and hoping for the best.

  “You’re welcome. I’ll be back to check your progress in a little while.”

  It took twenty minutes. Twenty of the longest minutes of my life before my erection slackened. I’d never been so happy to go soft in my entire life. With a smile I hopped down from the exam table and began dressing. Just as I was pulling on my jeans, Alexa came back to check on me.

  The look of surprise on her face stopped me short.

  “I think I’m good to go,” I explained, smiling big in her direction.

  Her eyes travelled down the length of my body, stopping once they reached the no-longer-straining bulge in my jeans. “Oh, good.”

  “Thanks for everything.” I grabbed my jacket from the chair, and started past her. I needed to get out of this hospital and this situation as quickly as possible. All I wanted was to forget about this fucked up night and get back home to check on Lily. Her hands darted out and pressed against my chest. “You can’t just leave. Dr. Chancellor wanted to um…talk with you, about your, um, lifestyle. And see if we could offer STD testing.”

  I laughed. “Thanks anyway, but I’m good.” I barely had time to date, let alone have sex, but when I did I always used a condom. Not to mention that Rick insisted I get tested as an agreement to work for him. All I wanted to do now was get home, check on Lily, and forget this whole night ever happened.

  “Okay. Well, be safe,” she said, and stepped out of the way as I fled past her, ready to put the whole experience behind me.

  CHAPTER 2

  * * *

  Alexa

  When I woke and fumbled for my cell phone to check the time, I was shocked to discover it was already four in the afternoon. I stretched and flung back my duvet, sighing because despite the late hour, my body was so not ready to leave my heavenly soft pillowtop.

  Working the midnight shift was wreaking havoc with my system. With each night that passed, I woke later and later in the afternoon. Thankfully, I had tonight off because today was m
y twenty-first birthday and tonight I was going out with some friends to celebrate. I could only imagine what MacKenzie had planned. That girl, though I considered her my best friend from our first meeting in nursing school, was trouble with a capital T.

  My parents didn’t understand why I worked so hard. Money certainly wasn’t the motivator—my family had more than we’d ever spend in a lifetime—but I wanted something more for myself. Something I was good at and kept me busy. Their only goal for me was to meet a wealthy, well-bred man and become some sort of Stepford Wife, a desire we did not share. A life like that sounded incredibly boring to me. And if my mother’s afternoon combination of happy pills and wine-spritzers were any indication, it was a life spent unfulfilled. No thanks.

  Reluctantly, I crawled out of bed and stumbled through my apartment desperate for a major caffeine hit. Once in the kitchen, I slid a coffee pod into the one-cup maker and impatiently waited. As I waited, I couldn’t stop myself from thinking back to the previous night, or more specifically, about Cade, and well a certain part of his anatomy .I’d seen a lot of strange things working the midnight shift in the emergency room, but his visit was one I would never forget.

  He was undeniably attractive, and that was even before I saw the python he was packing in his pants. He was tall and ridiculously toned from head to toe, with a rugged face and strong jaw line. His nose had a slight ridge that indicated it had probably been broken at some point, and those rich chocolate eyes of his had been surrounded by thick, dark lashes I would pay good money to achieve.

  He’d had the strangest effect on me. I’d never been attracted to a patient before. Ever. My job required that I remained professional at all times and I rarely noticed details about the actual person. That statement may sound harsh, but I saw the people who came in and out of the hospital as clinical objects. I only noticed the details I needed to perform my duties—like where there best vein line was to start an IV or draw blood, or calculating meds based on weight—standard things I’d been trained to notice. But with Cade, I couldn’t focus on what I needed to. Instead, I noticed how his dark eyes followed my every movement, the thickness of the vein running up the length of his shaft, and the tension in his body at his obvious discomfort every time I was close. I also noticed the tattoo peeking out from the collar of his T-shirt as if crawling up his neck. I wanted to see the rest of it, even if the mere thought of that made my tummy erupt in nerves. And I knew he could tell how frazzled I was with that annoying amused smirk tugging at his lips.

  Clearly I was overdue for a date if I was fantasizing about a patient.

  • • •

  When the doorbell chimed, I jogged to the intercom and buzzed in my best friend, MacKenzie and good friend, Tyson. I opened my apartment door and MacKenzie greeted me with a brown paper bag filled with liquor bottles in one hand and a plastic container in the other. Tyson, who was like a brother to me although I think he saw me as more, was carrying a bouquet of pink roses. When Kenzie had suggested celebrating my birthday, I’d made her promise that there would be no big party. It would just be the three of us going out and enjoying a few cocktails, loads of laughs, and some epic moves on the dance floor.

  “Our baby girl’s growing up, Ty!” MacKenzie squealed and pulled me in for a hug that took the breath out of my lungs. I patted her back and pulled away for some personal space. I wasn’t the best hugger in the world. Maybe it had something to do with the fact my parents weren’t the affectionate type so hugs weren’t a normal or welcomed occurrence to me. Tyson laughed and navigated around us, entering my apartment. He knew better than to try and hug me after I went completely stiff in his arms the one and only time he’d attempted it.

  “Thanks for the roses,” I called to his back as he made his way into my kitchen to fetch a vase. He’d spent enough time in my apartment to know where everything was. Heck, I think he knew my apartment better than I did. Once I called him to ask how to clean my hair out of the clogged shower drain and he informed me I had a bottle of drain cleaner under the sink in the kitchen. He was good to me, and so was MacKenzie. She often forced me out of my shell, which, however painful at times, was good for me.

  After releasing me from her arms, MacKenzie took over the kitchen island, extracting various bottles of alcohol and mixers from the bag she’d been carrying. Ty lined up three glasses and filled them with ice, while I stood and watched.

  “What’s in here?” I poked at the lid of the shallow plastic container, expecting it to hold a cake.

  “Jell-O shots,” MacKenzie answered, smiling. “Try one.”

  I pulled off the lid and set it aside. The container was filled with small plastic shot glasses that contained a rainbow of jellied concoctions. They certainly looked inviting. I selected a green one and tipped it up to my mouth, but the gelatinous mass remained firmly planted inside the cup.

  MacKenzie laughed and glanced at Tyson. “Teach her how, Ty. I forgot we had a Jell-O-shot virgin on our hands.” She measured two shots of clear liquor and dumped them into one of the glasses, mixing the drink like it was second nature.

  Ty smiled and rounded the island to stand next to me. “Stick out your tongue.”

  I narrowed my eyes at him.

  He chuckled. “Just do it.”

  I complied and he brought the cup to my mouth, showing me how to swirl my tongue around the edge of it to loosen the Jell-O until it slipped out of the cup and into my mouth.

  “Mmm. Green Apple?” I asked after swallowing.

  Ty wiped away a smear of Jell-O from my bottom lip and licked it from his finger.

  MacKenzie nodded, smiling proudly. “Yep. And here’s your birthday drink. Bottoms up bestie!”

  It was pink and bubbly and filled to the rim of the glass. I took a sip and sighed as the sugary goodness hit my tongue. You could hardly taste the vodka shots I’d seen her dump inside. It was grapefruit-y, delicious and dangerous, because they’d be way too easy to drink.

  “This is so good! You’re officially on drink duty all night.” I said with a wink.

  Once we all had drinks, courtesy of MacKenzie, Ty grabbed the pan of Jell-O shots and some snacks from the fridge and we made our way into the living room to sit in the center of my cream-colored shaggy rug for an impromptu boozy apartment picnic.

  “We need music.” MacKenzie announced, grabbing my laptop and opening it.

  “Oh shit,” I hissed, leaning over in a desperate effort to stop her seeing what I knew was on the screen but I was too late.

  MacKenzie’s eyes shot wide. “Holy shit!”

  My cheeks flamed because I knew exactly what she was looking at; naked pictures of Cade on a porn website.

  “What is it?” Ty asked, peeking around MacKenzie to see what was causing her outburst and the growing redness of my cheeks. His face scrunched in disgust when he looked at the screen. “Gah!” He jumped back from the computer like he’d just been stung by a bee.

  “You look at porn, Alexa?” The surprise in MacKenzie’s voice was unmistakable. “I’m not judging, not at all, proud is more like it—I’m just surprised. You’ve always seemed sort of innocent and definitely not a porn viewing kinda gal.”

  I swallowed and grabbed the laptop from her grip. “It’s not what you think.” Quickly, whilst trying desperately not to sneak a quick look at naked Cade, I opened my music library and started my playlist of indie-rock before setting the computer aside, far enough away from MacKenzie.

  MacKenzie laughed, throwing her head back. “Sorry, sweetheart, but what I just saw is gonna require an explanation. I mean come on, you’ve never taken a Jell-O shot, you were raised by the Walton’s, and your freaking panty-drawer is organized by color and day of the week. Spill it, babe.”

  Tyson glanced up from his drink. “You’ve got day-of-the-week underwear? Oh, I’ve gotta see this.” He stood and wandered down the hall before disappearing into my bedroom. MacKenzie and I jumped to our feet to follow.

  “Ty!” I called. “Get out of there!�
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  He chuckled and pulled open the top drawer of my hand-carved, pale-pink dresser. “Holy shit, you weren’t kidding, Kenz.” He lifted a pair of white cotton briefs from the top of the pile and held them up to inspect. “Sunday,” he read the backside, chuckling.

  I snatched them from his grasp, tossed them back in the drawer and slammed it shut with my hip. “Enough. Out.” I shooed them from my bedroom. Yes, I bought the packaged cotton undies with the days of the week on them. They were comfy. Sue me. And it’s not like anyone ever saw them—unless you count my friends who apparently had zero boundaries.

  MacKenzie stood her ground, blocking the door to my bedroom. “Only if you tell us why you were looking at porn. Do you even own a sex toy?”

  “I’ll tell you.” I navigated my way around her and stepped into the hallway. But I was so not answering the sex-toy question. Even if Ty was like a brother to us, he was still male, and I wasn’t about to admit that I had a vibrator tucked in the back of my underwear drawer. God, I would have been mortified if they’d found that.

  Once we were seated on the living room rug again I downed a few more Jell-O shots to ease my nerves and pulled a throw pillow into my lap. MacKenzie sat across from me, looking smug, leaning back against the sofa.

  “Okay. So last night in the ER…” I grabbed another shot and slurped down the gelatinous mouthful, needing to fortify myself at the memory of Cade’s erection.

  “There was this guy…”

  Their mouths tipped up in eager smiles as I relayed the details of my night.

  “How big would you say it was?” MacKenzie asked once I was through my story, leaning forward with eager curiosity.

  “Ah hell, that’s it. I’m out. I’m making another drink,” Ty announced, standing to head into the kitchen.

  After considering—and rejecting a nearby candlestick and finding nothing else adequate in my living room to showcase the full length of Cade’s manhood, Kenzie and I made our way into the kitchen, giggling at my idea to retrieve a cucumber from the refrigerator.